Field of the Invention
This disclosure relates to an image formation apparatus, an image processing system, a control program, and a communication management method, and particularly to an image formation apparatus remotely operable via wireless communication with a terminal device, an image processing system including that image formation apparatus, a control program for that image formation apparatus, and a communication management method in the image processing system including that image formation apparatus.
Description of the Related Art
There exists an image formation apparatus capable of wireless communication with a terminal device. An image formation apparatus which has a wireless communication function is remotely operable from a terminal device. In order to implement remote control, the image formation apparatus by way of example transmits information to the terminal device via wireless communication for displaying an operation screen. The terminal device transmits to the image formation apparatus via wireless communication information which represents the user's operation position relative to that operation screen. The image formation apparatus determines operation content based on an operation position of the user on the operation screen of the terminal device, and performs an image formation process indicated.
Such a remotely operable image formation apparatus has a limit in the number of terminal devices that the image formation apparatus can accept remote operation therefrom simultaneously depending on its throughput. However, there is a case in which the image formation apparatus may receive requests for wireless communication from a number of terminal devices more than that of terminal devices from which the image formation apparatus can receive such requests. For example, if information for wireless communication that is stored in a terminal device that previously had wireless communication with the image formation apparatus is used to automatically connect the terminal device to the image formation apparatus via wireless communication, the terminal device would automatically be connected to the image formation apparatus via wireless communication simply as the user of the terminal device passes through a range allowing communication with the image formation apparatus. Thus, the number of terminal devices connected to the image formation apparatus via wireless communication would easily reach an upper limit number.
In such a case, using techniques of communication control disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication Nos. 2008-085792, 09-261735, 2006-140800, 2014-143461, etc., is considered. These documents disclose techniques in which when there are requests for communication beyond a number of devices for which simultaneous communication can be done, communication for any device beyond the number of devices for which simultaneous communication can be done is automatically severed. When the above image formation apparatus receives requests for remote operation beyond a number of terminal devices from which the image formation apparatus can accept remote operation, the techniques disclosed in the above patent documents can be utilized to automatically sever communication with any of the terminal devices and thus allow the image formation apparatus to accept additional remote operation.
However, when the techniques disclosed in the above patent documents are applied to the above image formation apparatus, wireless communication with a terminal device while it is remotely controlling the image formation apparatus may be severed, wireless communication with a terminal device of a user who has a high authority of use for the image formation apparatus may be severed, or the like. That is, simply applying the techniques disclosed in the above patent documents to the above image formation apparatus may interfere with remote operation depending on the terminal device disconnected.